Chapter 8 - The Smoke Alarm

"Move!" Reeves shouted.

Rachel grabbed the DeShawn Price folder. Nia grabbed two others. The fire alarm screamed as they pushed into the hallway.

Smoke was thicker near the copy room, gray and bitter.

A custodian ran past with an extinguisher.

"Trash can fire!" he yelled. "Everybody out!"

They joined staff flooding toward the exit.

Outside, cold air hit Rachel's lungs like a slap.

Within minutes, firefighters entered the building.

The fire was small.

Too small.

A plastic trash bin had burned beside the records-room wall. No electrical fault. No obvious reason.

Nia stared through the glass doors. "You think somebody tried to burn those files?"

Rachel did not answer immediately.

"I think we preserve facts before we build theories."

"That's lawyer talk."

"Yes. Because lawyer talk keeps bad people from calling us reckless."

Reeves joined them, face gray.

"There's a camera in that hallway."

"Good," Rachel said. "Pull the footage now."

He looked sick.

"The camera has been offline since last week."

Rachel stared at him.

"Who reported the outage?"

"Facilities."

"Who supervises facilities?"

Reeves didn't answer.

He didn't need to.

Thomas Baxter chaired the district operations committee.

That afternoon, the district superintendent, Dr. Elaine Porter, called an emergency board meeting for Friday night.

Thomas Baxter announced he would attend and "defend the integrity of the school system."

At home, Malik watched the news in silence until his father switched it off.

"Everybody keeps saying my name," Malik said.

Andre sat beside him. "I know."

"I didn't want this."

"I know."

"What if people hate me now?"

Andre took a long breath. "Some people will hate anybody who forces them to look at something ugly. That doesn't make the ugly thing your fault."

Malik stared at his bandaged hand.

"Do I have to go to that meeting?"

"No."

"What if I want to?"

Andre looked at him carefully.

"Then we go together."

That night, Rachel received a call from a blocked number.

A man's voice said, "You're looking in the wrong cabinet."

"Who is this?"

"Ask about the scholarship fund."

Then the line went dead.

Twenty minutes later, an email arrived containing one attachment.

A spreadsheet.

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At the top were the words: BAXTER EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATION.

And beside several large payments were the names of families who had filed complaints.